Gay soldier booed by Republicans says military has been “awesome about this”
Army Captain Steve Hill appeared on Hardball with Chris Matthews tonight to discuss his reaction to being booed by attendees of a Republican Presidential debate. He said he had submitted his question because of mixed feelings at public events where he felt proud yet that he “had been fighting for everbody’s rights except” his own.
”I was pretty suprised when the boos happened. It was shocking to me. My gut kind of dropped out…. I was a little bit afraid I had done something wrong. But I think worse was, probably, was Mr. Santorum‘s response got so many cheers, where he said it’s a ‘special privilege’ for me to be in the military.
”I can’t tell you how many times people had to come over to my house — fellow soldiers — and I’d have to run through my own house, and I’d have to hide pictures of me and Josh, my husband that I’m married to, and I mean, that’s not a special privilege to me at all….”
”The military has been 100% positive. Everybody in the military has been awesome about this…. I think that when people know you as a soldier, they know you you’re a soldier and that’s what matters to them…. My soldiers were really, really angry about [Rep. Alfred Baldasaro comments that he was glad that they booed], because he basically said ‘we wouldn’t protect him in the field.’ And they said, ‘That’s not correct at all. We would always protect a fellow soldier. It would be horrible horrible for anybody to think that a soldier wouldn’t protect another soldier, gay or straight. So the military has been awesome.”
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